


The Herald Rests

by edibleflowers



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Comfort, Cuddling & Snuggling, Drunkenness, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-18
Updated: 2015-06-18
Packaged: 2018-04-05 00:46:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 870
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4159215
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/edibleflowers/pseuds/edibleflowers
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Aranel isn’t good for much of anything after drinking with Bull, but he really wants to be.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Herald Rests

**Author's Note:**

> This takes place after slaying the first dragon (in this case, the Abyssal High Dragon in the Western Approach). Just some fluffy comfort.

Dorian wakes out of a sound sleep to the bed shaking as someone climbs into it, clumsy and making a bad attempt at stifling giggles. When the body flops down on him, he recognizes the scent, albeit overlaid in strong spirits, as that of the Inquisitor – his lover – Aranel Lavellan.

“Get off me,” he mutters, “you’re heavy.” It’s not true – Aranel is lithe and narrow of frame, lighter than Dorian – but he has a point to make. Aranel slumps over him instead, and that’s when Dorian becomes aware of two things at once: first, that Aranel has joined him in his own bed, and second, that Aranel is very drunk. He suspects that the latter is what has led to the former, and while he can’t complain about the results–

“Inquisitor,” he says. He keeps it quiet; the rooms over the tavern are private, but wooden walls are thin and allow every kind of noise to be heard from without. In response, Aranel gives a huffing laugh and tugs down on the warm comforter. Dorian hisses at the inrush of cold air and yanks the comforter up again. “This is not–”

“It’s not what?” Aranel’s pinning him under the sheets now, his grey eyes dark, fuddled with drink. “Wanted to see you. Didn’t want to go back to the keep.” Almost sulkily, he lets himself flop down on Dorian again and sticks out his lower lip in a rather effective pout. Dorian’s mind drifts, still half-asleep and remembering how sweet that lip tastes between his own.

“Get in, then.” He draws the comforter back, nudges at Aranel to move. The Inquisitor does so, if a bit belatedly, nearly ending up on the floor before he manages to scramble under the comforter.

Dorian manages to suppress a sigh of disappointment: Aranel is still fully clothed. He hasn’t even removed his boots. Not that he would take advantage of anyone in the state Aranel is in, but all those silver buttons and ornaments are going to be murder on his own bare skin. “What have you been doing?” he asks, as he starts in on the clasps of Aranel’s overshirt.

“Drinking with Bull,” Aranel starts, making a sound halfway between a laugh and a cough. “To, to celebrate killing the dragon.”

“Ahh.” That would certainly explain it. Dorian had caught a whiff of the alcohol Iron Bull had been drinking after the Chargers came back from their previous mission; that stuff had been potent enough to peel paint from the walls. From the smell on Aranel’s breath, whatever they’d been toasting with tonight could probably kill plants on contact. “Remind me to thank him for not inviting me.”

Stripping Aranel is useless – Dorian would have an easier time skinning a live eel – and he gives up at last, pushing the covers back to at least tug Aranel’s boots off. Now, naturally, Aranel whines and tries to pull the comforter over himself again. Dorian doesn’t know whether to laugh or curse; somehow, though, he succeeds at last in removing both boots, then gives up the rest as a bad job and lets himself fall back to the mattress once more. With a triumphant smile, Aranel collapses above him.

“So you let the Iron Bull buy you drinks tonight?” Dorian murmurs, a hand smoothing down Aranel’s rumpled hair. “What part of that sounded like a good idea?”

Aranel goes quiet for a long moment, his face tucked in against Dorian’s shoulder. “Didn’t want to think about things,” he says at last, quiet, breath warm, giving Dorian a little shiver of pleasure. “When we fought it. I was scared out of my skin.”

“You,” Dorian says; he can’t help a low scoff. “You charged in like you were born to fight those things.”

“When you went down,” Aranel mutters, and that makes Dorian’s stomach go cold. It had only been for a moment; if anything, it had been his own fault for stepping back too fast to avoid a gout of fiery breath. He’d forgotten about the pile of gurn bones behind him, had tripped and fallen flat to the sandy ground, the impact slapping the breath out of him. Though Varric had been right there to give him a hand and yank him upright, he’d seen – if only for an instant – the panic in Aranel’s eyes. He’d been distracted from the fight, which was not a good thing when several tons of Abyssal High Dragon were trying to claw you to death.

“I’m here,” Dorian says at last. It feels as inadequate as it sounded. They’d shared a tent all the way back from the Western Approach, but since their return several days ago, Aranel had been far too busy to spare even a moment for Dorian in passing. Dorian found himself suddenly grateful for Bull’s attempt to get the Inquisitor completely shitfaced drunk – and wondered, just a little, if the former Ben-Hassrath hadn’t done it on purpose. Aranel would no doubt have spent the night in his own quarters otherwise.

“Not letting you go.” Aranel’s words come out in a deep slur, and moments later, Dorian feels his lover’s body relaxing into sleep. Dorian closes his eyes and smiles. He’d needed this, too.


End file.
